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I was thinking about literature about addictions. I suppose the people on this site will be most familiar with Hunter S. Thompson and Charles Bukowski. I tried to read the Rum Diaries and found them a bit souless. Bukowski is very good on work, very good on shitty menial jobs, but I don't think its actually all that challenging. In terms of American writing I think O'Neil's Long Days Journey into Night, that is brutal and harrowing. Open up and Bleed. English Low Life writing seems to be more concerned with class - Down and out in London and Paris and Jerrey Bernard; they are always very concerned with making a social commentary. One of the best English books I read recently was What a carve up. Again all to do with class. There is possibly a trend of classlessness about certain british characters in the movies recently. Some of the best British films I have seen recently - Croupier, Layer Cake and possibly Dirty Pretty Things, the characters seem to come from nowwhere. Theres' a coolness about them. They seem to have a lot to do with greed. British Gangster movies seem to come with that. The two best British gangster films - The Long Good Friday and Get Carter seem to be anti materialistic. Its funny how a lot of the money that was floating around under Thatcher seemed to come from crime. Possibly because people stopped caring about Civil Society. There is an aspect about those Chandlereasque characters is their classlessness. Thats what I used to find so fascinating about crime fiction. The characters seemed to be so mobile. The direct opposite of the characters mentioned in the beginning.